"What are you two doing, then?" asked Rese, coming to walk beside Colby. Meili had flown ahead for the moment.
"We're just trying to reach the next city." Said Colby, giving Rese a confused look. The Pikachu rolled his eyes.
"I get that. But you're wearing a scarf but claim to be wild, and you're trying to reach a human city through an area that you're not native to. You don't exactly blend in."
"We're..." Colby paused, not sure how to explain this to the Pikachu. After all, he had only found out about the gyms from his father, who had experience with humans. "We're on a journey. Me and Meili wanted to go with a trainer for ages but never got caught so we … left on our own."
Rese looked interested. "So you're doing the trainer thing without a trainer? I've actually considered going with one before."
"Really?" Colby had been under the impression that he and Meili were rather unusual for wanting a trainer.
"It would probably be better than here. I sometimes don't know what's worse, the bugs or the other Pikachu."
Colby thought over that for a few seconds. Perhaps Rese could come with them? The plan had been for it to be just be him and Meili but, looking at it now, they probably wouldn't get too far like that. Rese seemed nice enough and, despite Meili's initial dislike, had gotten along well with both of them. Colby was about to offer when Rese interrupted his train of thought.
"I also meant to ask: what's with you and Meili?"
"What?" Colby demanded, whipping his head around to face Rese.
"You don't seem afraid of her."
"Oh. Well, We've been friends since she was a Pidgey."
"That explains a little. Still," Rese gave Colby a conspiratorial smile, "Your relationship must be something special to get over that."
Looking down, Colby mumbled, "I try to not let it get to me." He fell silent before adding, "How come you're not afraid?"
"I don't need to be. Electricity hurts birds, so most just learn to stay away."
Thinking back to their last week of training, he remembered Meili being told something about being careful around electric types. He found himself rather envious of the Pikachu beside him. If only Colby's species had some kind of advantage over their predators like that, maybe he wouldn't be afraid of his best friend now. Then again, maybe Meili would have just stayed away and the two would have never met.
"What's that about birds?" Demanded a voice from overhead as Meili came swooping down.
Rese grinned, "Just explaining why us Pikachu don't need to be afraid of you."
"Really?" Meili asked, narrowing her eyes. Rese was more than happy to respond. He crossed his arms.
"Sure. You ever even been hit by electricity?"
"Sure have. It didn't even hurt." She raised the wing that had been Thunder Punched the previous day. Colby could still remember Meili's shriek of pain from that particular hit and took a step back. He knew his friend enough to know she would want to prove she could take on the Pikachu.
"Obviously a weak attack. How about I show you what real electricity feels like?"
"You know what" Meili fluttered off the ground. "Hit me!"
Colby sighed. Deciding to let them get on with it, he slipped away into the underbrush to search for some oran berries for when one of them inevitably got hurt. Soon the battle was reduced to a few faint sounds accompanied by distant flashes. Colby took this opportunity to relax. The last week had hardly given him a moment to himself so he relished the opportunity. As he started to chew on a nearby tree, his thoughts drifted toward the Pikachu. He had feared Rese a bit at first. What Zahra told them still stuck with Colby, but he found it difficult to relate the reports of aggressive Pokémon to the friendly and open mouse they had met. He definitely wouldn't mind if Rese were to join and, if the sounds of the distant battle were anything to go by, Meili would appreciate a traveling companion who relished combat as much as she did.
"There's one." Said something.
Colby froze. That had been a human. For a brief moment, Colby thought that they were talking about him but, as he turned, he found the speaker was looking towards the distant battle.
The human appeared to be male, with short blond hair under an orange and black cap. His clothes were light and airy, cargo pants and a tight shirt, easy to move in. Colby found himself most fascinated by an array of mechanical objects along the man's belt. Beside him, and looking up at its trainer with a displeased look in its crimson eyes, stood a golden nine-tailed fox. The man said something and Colby walked closer in time to catch his Pokémon's reply.
"I still say that this isn't what we signed up for." Of course, the human failed to understand her exact meaning but still responded.
"I don't like it either, but the higher ups say this cull is best. They're becoming a real threat, apparently."
The pair continued onward but Colby had stopped paying attention.
That word, cull, was familiar to him. Unbidden, memories of the winter before he met Meili burst before his eyes.
He and his siblings being ushered into the burrow; some of the older Rattata demanding to know what was going on as Colby curled up against the back wall. Overhearing his father and grandmother talking about some disease that the humans were worried about and, after a few weeks, re-emerging to a forest of far fewer Sentret than he remembered.
Apparently, the Sentret had been catching a new disease and the humans decided to deal with that before it got out of hand. Colby never learned what had become of the Sentret, but looking back now it wasn't hard to guess.
But why were they talking about it now? Colby pulled himself to the present to look after the retreating form of the human and his Pokémon. If they were carrying out a cull, then one species in this forest was at risk.
"Rese!" Colby whispered and shot off. The pair weren't going that fast. If he used his Quick Attack he could probably reach the clearing before them and get his friends to hide.
And reach it he did. But it was too late. A second human emerged from behind a tree in the clearing. She was dressed similarly to the man and carried a grey cylindrical device in one hand.
"Run!" Colby tried to scream, but the words never formed. He had caught sight of a monstrous black canine Pokémon beside the woman and, predictably, froze in place. Colby would never regret anything more.
The woman's device jolted with a crack. Rese only had time to turn his head towards the sound before something tore through him and he dropped.
Colby could only mouth the Pikachu's name in horror as the scene continued to unfold.
Meili abandoned the attack she had been preparing and was left staring at her suddenly downed opponent, her face unmoving.
"Rese?"
She landed and took a step forward. Her eyes followed the splatter of blood in growing horror which shifted to rage when the woman stepped into the open.
"You!" In a sudden burst of motion, Meili threw herself at the woman. Her horned Pokémon unleashed a fireball and the man Colby had followed launched a disk leading a stream of white light toward her. Neither of these things stopped Meili.
A second crack rang out and Meili let out a screech of pain and fury and tumbled to the forest floor.
It was only now that Colby could will himself to move. He rushed towards Meili. With a burst of energy, he slipped into Quick Attack and a second later he was beside his fallen friend and checking for her heartbeat. It was there, but faint. The shot appeared to have gone through her wing, possibly breaking it.
Rese, however... Rese was dead.
"Celia, what was that?" Asked the man, stepping out from the tree line with his partner. He and his Pokémon glared at the woman. "We're only meant to be going for the Pikachu."
"I panicked!" The woman put away her smoking cylinder. "It attacked me."
"And what's your capture styler for?" demanded the man, catching the disk and holding it up with the device it had come from. The woman grimaced, her hand falling to an identical device on her belt. "I just didn't think."
"Well, you've just shot a trainer's Pokémon."
"What?"
"Look at the Rattata."
Upon noticing Colby's scarf, the blond woman gasped.
"You don't think the Pikachu was also..."
The man strolled over and knelt beside Meili saying "Let's hope not. We told trainers to keep their Pikachu recalled for now so you might be lucky. Still, we should deal with this and get out of here."
Reaching into his backpack, he pulled out a bottle and aimed it at Meili. Colby went to block his friend from view.
"Don't worry, this will help." Assured the man but Colby wasn't ready to listen to reason. A soft growl found its way out his throat causing the man to reach for the disk launching device again.
"I won't harm your friend." The disk drifted out once more and started to rotate around Colby. As a circle of white began to form, Colby began to calm down. Meili would be okay. The man had a potion that would heal the wound. His job was ... His job was to help Pokémon? This last one confused Colby a little. It conflicted with what he had seen from the uniformed humans so far. It didn't matter though. For whatever reason, Colby now fully trusted the man in front of him.
"Thank you." the man said as Colby stepped aside. Catching the disk in one hand, he began to spray Meili's wounded wing with the bottle. Meili shifted a little, but remained unconscious.
"Where's your trainer?"
Colby jumped and looked around to see the black dog peering down at him.
"Wha ... what?" Colby squeaked, eying the Pokémon's constantly bared teeth.
"Your trainer. You obviously have one. Where are they?"
"Oh ..." Colby thought. What if they were only helping because they didn't know they were wild? He decided not to risk it. "He's a bit over that way. We... uh... we wandered off a bit."
"Well then." The black dog sat down. "Hopefully he won't be back soon. It wouldn't do to have people finding out that rangers are shooting Pokémon, let alone trained ones."
Colby's eyes were drawn towards Rese's body before he averted his gaze, his breath catching in his throat. He felt several long, soft objects loosely wrap around him. The smooth, feminine voice of the fox said,
"Maybe it wouldn't be so bad. We're rangers. Daniel and I didn't sign up to be killers."
"You know why we're doing it."
Their conversation quickly became background noise to Colby as he watched Daniel the ranger. He had finished with the potion and was wrapping a bandage around Meili's body, holding the wing in place. Meili wouldn't be flying any time soon, that much was obvious. Colby found himself wondering if she would ever fly again. The thought made him feel sick. Remembering how light and carefree Meili appeared when in flight, he could only imagine how much of a blow the loss would be.
"That's about all I can do for now." Daniel stated, carefully positioning Meili on her uninjured side and standing up. "We need to get going."
"What about their trainer?" Celia asked. Her eyes flitted to Colby's scarf once more.
"They'll be confused, but it's probably for the best they don't find out it was us. Hopefully they'll keep the bandage on until they can get to a centre."
"I guess."
Walking over to Rese, Celia took out a bag. As Colby watched in dismay, she placed the broken body inside and tied it shut. He wanted to stop her, to save the body, but didn't want to leave Meili's side. Not that he could have done anything with the two more powerful Pokémon present.
Then the rangers departed. The clearing was suddenly very quiet. A slight breeze shifted leaves overhead and the chirps of far off bug-types occasionally drifted from the darkness, but all Colby could hear was the rapid beating of his heart and his roaring blood. His gaze lingered, unfocussed, over his friend's stillness and on the spot where the two orange and black-clad humans had vanished.
He soon set about moving Meili. After some effort, he had carefully pushed her to the cover of a bush. It was only then that he curled up and decided to get some rest, sobbing gently until unconsciousness crept over his mind.
